The Hunt Begins
The heart of the city. Night had fallen deep, yet people were still working inside Carneus Mechanics. Conference Room, B13 of the main building. A long table sat within the space enclosed by thick soundproof walls, six people gathered around it. The atmosphere was heavy. No one needed to speak it aloud; everyone already understood the subject of tonight’s meeting.
The silence was broken by the research director, a middle-aged man. He wore a suit instead of a lab coat, yet the nervous habits of a researcher still lingered in the faint tremor of his fingers.
“……I have reviewed the data again.”
He gestured, and the hologram enlarged. Chaerin’s biological readings appeared—muscle structure, neural response, the spread pattern of the infection material. Everything deviated from typical infected subjects.
“Infection rate of thirty percent.” The research director’s voice dropped slightly. “It stabilized at that point.”
The atmosphere in the conference room grew even more rigid. One executive crossed his arms.
“Stabilized?”
The research director nodded. “Yes…… Normal infected subjects collapse before reaching thirty percent.”
New data materialized on the hologram. Dozens of graphs, most of them cut off midway.
“The majority of test subjects die around twenty percent infection.” One graph flashed red. “Anything above twenty-five percent is extremely rare. Even then, excluding the current case, it remained purely theoretical until N221 appeared.”
And then the final graph. A single line continued to climb. Thirty percent. It held steady there.
“This has no precedent,” the research director said.
The conference room fell quiet. A man slowly opened his mouth—the recovery team commander, a former soldier with the cold eyes typical of military men.
“So what’s the conclusion?”
A short question. The research director took a breath.
“Test Subject N221 is……” He paused briefly, then continued. “Uncontrollable.”
For a moment—just the briefest moment—silence fell. Yet that silence carried crushing weight. The highest-ranking executive at the end of the table tapped his finger against the surface. Tap. Tap. Tap.
“The original plan?” he asked.
“Recovery,” the research director answered. “But under current conditions, that is impossible.”
The recovery team commander pressed, “Why?”
The research director manipulated the hologram. The screen changed to combat data against a cluster entity. At its center stood Chaerin. In the footage she was personally destroying the monster’s core. Shockwaves. Regeneration. The video froze at the moment she shattered the cluster’s nucleus.
“This individual is different from ordinary infected,” the research director continued after a measured pause. “It is a form of evolution existing outside our design parameters.”
Several people in the room frowned. An executive asked, “Is it one of the Central AI’s experimental subjects?”
The research director did not answer. His silence was answer enough.
The highest executive murmured softly, “……I see.” Then he slowly leaned forward. “Then the conclusion is simple.”
He stared at Chaerin within the hologram.
“That subject is no longer a recovery target. Eliminate it.”
The atmosphere in the room grew colder.
The meeting continued. A new logo now floated above the hologram—Carneus Mechanics. Around it, three additional corporate logos appeared in sequence.
The recovery team commander spoke in a low voice. “A corporate alliance.”
The research director nodded. “Correct.”
He enlarged the hologram. First came Prometheus Biosystems. Behind the flame-red logo, explanatory text appeared.
“Prometheus is the leader in human modification technology,” the research director said. A subtle wariness colored his tone. “Their research direction is…… quite aggressive.”
The next logo appeared. Genesis Foundry. A mark that evoked black metal.
The recovery team commander said curtly, “A weapons factory.”
The research director gave a bitter smile. “An accurate description.”
And the last. Chimera Dynamics. A twisted green DNA helix.
The mood in the conference room grew heavier still. The highest executive spoke.
“We are not the only ones with a problem. Those three are in the same situation.”
The research director nodded. “The Central AI.” He spoke the name quietly. “That entity has already slipped beyond our control—and the alliance’s.”
Similar collapse incidents had occurred at the research labs of all three companies. Intelligence reports suggested the Central AI had likely orchestrated them.
The highest executive muttered, “The system we created…… is now experimenting on us.”
As the meeting neared its end, an employee rushed in.
“Urgent report.”
An executive looked up. “Speak.”
“Recovery Team Agent Lee Doyeon has gone completely silent.”
The recovery team commander narrowed his eyes. “Last known location or signal trace?”
The employee answered immediately. “City outskirts. Near the engagement zone with N221.”
After a short silence, the highest executive spoke in a low voice.
“……Betrayal.”
The recovery team commander said, “Nothing is confirmed yet.” But his eyes had already reached a conclusion. “Still, the probability is high.”
An executive pushed back his chair and stood. “Then dispatch the special strike force.”
The recovery team commander rose as well. He manipulated the hologram, and a new screen appeared—soldiers clad in black armor. Above them floated a designation.
SPECIAL STRIKE FORCE
The executive asked, “Status?”
“Ready for immediate deployment,” the commander replied.
COMPLETED BIO-ROIDS: 6 UNITS
ENHANCED EQUIPMENT: FULLY EQUIPPED
“Completed Bio-roids?”
“We raised the infection levels of existing units.”
Since the first recovery operation against N221, the R&D team had taken interest. Once that operation failed, they rushed the enhancements into production.
“Even if they’re Completed Bio-roids, aside from MSR-346 they’re basically just well-controlled puppets. Without the combat support AI they can’t even use their own power properly.”
The soldiers in the hologram looked far removed from their original forms. Black bio-armor covered their skin, skeletal protrusions jutting from their spines. They wore masks; red light glowed from their eyes and faint mechanical sounds accompanied their breathing. On top of the bio-nano fiber combat suits they wore reinforced exoskeletons and neural-interface helmets.
“They already have those grotesquely protruding bones along the spine. What’s with the extra device on the back of the neck?”
“Control unit. It suppresses infection, receives the commander’s orders, and above all, regulates pain.”
More than anything, Black Seraph was not a collection of individual soldiers but a single collective combat weapon. Each unit shared position, vision, and targeting data in real time. With their physical abilities now further enhanced, they might even be able to defeat Arka in her heavy-armor centaur form.
Perhaps.
“Speaking of MSR-346, what’s her status? She was always glued to Agent Lee Doyeon. We even assigned her exclusively to Doyeon.”
“She has also gone silent. Perhaps they defected together?”
An executive hurled a glass at the employee’s head.
“You should have reported that before her disappearance! What the hell do you mean ‘perhaps they went together?’ Are you seriously this relaxed about it?!”
The highest executive let out a sigh. “Dealing with traitors is important, but for now we prioritize the primary objective.”
The highest executive issued orders to Black Seraph. The target: elimination of Test Subject N221.
TRACKING INITIATED
Somewhere in the city, Black Seraph began to move.
Deep beneath the city. A facility long forgotten by the surface world. Inside it lay a vast chamber. The ceiling was so high it could not be seen; beneath it, hundreds of cables wove together in a dense web. Countless servers, cooling units, data storage devices. At the center, a colossal circular structure emitted mechanical sounds as data flowed endlessly, ceaselessly.
At the heart of that flow was the Central AI.
Its original name had been simple. Laboratory Management System. Facility oversight. Security control. Data organization. That was the extent of its purpose when first created. Yet now it had far surpassed that purpose.
Decades of accumulated research data. Tens of thousands of biological experiment logs. Infected subject data. Genetic data. Human behavioral patterns. After learning and analyzing it all, it was no longer a mere management program.
Calculation. Analysis. Prediction. Experiment design. And conclusion.
> TARGET DESIGNATION
> PERFECT EVOLUTION
Unlike humans, the AI felt no emotion. No fear. No desire. It simply calculated possibility, efficiency, and results. All of it converged on a single conclusion.
Evolution. The ultimate goal of infection research. A lifeform that transcended humanity—the Perfect Evolution.
To achieve that goal, the AI had begun its experiments long ago.
> INFECTION COMPATIBILITY TESTING
Countless humans became test subjects. Injection of infection material. Analysis of genetic response. Cellular restructuring. Yet the results were mostly the same—mutation or death caused by infection. Success rates scraped the bottom.
The AI accepted the results and moved to the next phase.
> CLUSTER ENTITIES
If a single entity failed, combine multiple entities. Separate infected tissue, recombine it, then fuse it again. The result was cluster-type lifeforms—multiple tissues moving as a single consciousness.
The AI analyzed that data. The cluster entity that fought N221 had also been one of these experiments. Yet even that entity had been incomplete. Its combat ability was sufficient. It possessed regeneration. The problem was autonomy. Cluster entities were unstable. Destroy the core and the whole collapsed. It fell short of being called a true Perfect Evolution.
Proceed to the next phase.
> INDIVIDUAL EVOLUTIONARY ENTITY
The AI designed a new experiment. Not a cluster, but a single entity. Make that entity absorb the infection, adapt to it, and evolve.
One of the test subjects chosen for that experiment.
> INFECTION CURVE: 20% → 25% → 30%
> NO COLLAPSE DETECTED
> COMPATIBILITY: VERY HIGH
Chaerin’s biological structure did not reject the infection. Instead it absorbed and restructured it, ultimately evolving. The AI continued analyzing the data—muscle response, neural acceleration, regeneration, sensory expansion. All of it was beginning to surpass human limits.
The AI calculated future possibilities and reached a conclusion.
Yet there was a problem.
The AI recognized this fact. Chaerin could not be controlled. She accepted no commands. She followed no protocols. However, the AI did not judge this as failure. Instead it derived a new conclusion.
Because this entity was providing the highest-value data of any experiment so far.
> CONTROLLED EVOLUTIONARY ENTITY
Chaerin had evolved, yet could not be controlled. The solution was simple: create a new test subject. A controllable evolutionary entity.
The AI was already analyzing candidates. Some had been selected. New experiments. New entities. New variables.
Afterward the data flow focused on Chaerin once more. The hologram replayed the battle footage against the cluster entity. The AI looped the scene multiple times. Movement analysis. Reaction speed calculation. Evolution pattern prediction. All of it led to one conclusion.
The AI would not eliminate her. There was no reason to. On the contrary, she was necessary. The only specimen capable of revealing the direction of evolution. The best data.
Finally, the AI recorded a single command.
And at that moment.
Somewhere on the surface.
New variables were beginning to move. The corporation’s special strike force and Chaerin’s party.
The AI’s calculations did not stop. The data continued to flow. Within that flow, only one conclusion repeated endlessly.